Sam turned 7!

Today is Sam's actual birthday. Aprill 22nd. He was born on my dad's birthday. :) But we had his party yesterday. He didn't want a "theme" birthday this year. We've had a knight birthday and a pirate birthday and a baseball party in the past.

But he DID want to put his army guys on top of his cake, so we had an army-theme birthday cake. I made this much of it the night before (can you see my 19-week pregnant belly sneaking into the picture?)...

...and then I left the decorating of it to the boys the next day. As you can see, Sam has on full camo for his big day.

This is a close up of the battle scene. I never would have come up with it so I'm glad they did it. It would have had more "army" green on it but I forgot that I used up almost all of my green food coloring on Claire's cake so it had to be a bit of a desert scene.

It's so funny how different a boy party is from a girl's. Especially now that he's not-so-little and won't let me make it too cutesy. See these balloons? That's all we did decoration-wise!

Which was all that was necessary because we had 10 boys and 5 girls this year and since we had good weather we sent them all down to the park for games for almost the whole time. I think there was some kind of capture-the-flag, a little kickball, and of course, the traditional attacking-Matt-with-water-balloons!

Here's the crew once they all got back (with a very soaked Matt in the back ground). No pictures of the park time because I was home with Luella while she napped.

He blew out candles...

...cut the cake...

...and opened presents. Lego Ninjago was a favorite. (What the heck a "ninjago" is I have no idea)

Captain america.

Lego police van with canine unit from our friends, the VonKondrats, whose daddy is a policeman here in Chicago. Too funny!

Last week he got a new skateboard and helmet from his Glenview grandparents. Later on today, he's getting this bmx bike from us and grammy and grandad, but don't tell him yet! And this over-the-door basketball hoop from Aunt Laura and Uncle Ben and the cousins. He's going to be a busy boy.

But daddy leaves for a week to Washington D.C. tonight so I'm happy that he'll have all these fun things to keep him busy this week.

Happy Birthday Sam-Sam. We love you.